PL charge City for alleged breaches of financial rules

[Cassandra]

Bloody hell. Remember MCVTA?

Still sending emails, mostly match reports - was particularly good with humour when we were struggling in the lower divisions. Still worth reading.

 

[chedinho]

Some cases are still heard even when there was no chance of a party winning. For example, Bennell Victims versus MCFC. The court spent 2 weeks arguing if Bennell had been a vicarious MCFC employee (ie an employe paid off the books). This was an attempt to make City liable to pay additional damages.

In the ruling, the judge stated the Bennell victims counsel had failed to prove the case. However he also stated even if they had proved it MCFC were NOT liable because of where and when the offences occurred.
So wtf did the judge not stop the hearing on day one ?. I just don't understand the Law.

Chaos is Cash

 

[spacecadet]

Against: City, Fulham, Aston Villa, West Brom, Swansea, Southampton.

Abstained: The Cunts from Reading.

Thus it squeezed through.

 

[There is a Light]

I've just listened to the podcast featuring @Prestwich_Blue saying our charges come down to 4 breaches, & multiples of those to get to the PL's 115 charges.

1. Mancini's Consultancy contract with Al Jazira.

Mancini was paid £1.45m plus bonuses by City, but had a second £1.75m Consultancy contract with Al Jazira Sports & Cultural Club which was owned by ADUG, the parent company of Manchester City.

The Der Spiegel claim is ADUG paid Al Jazira the money which was paid to Mancini as a Consultancy fee to help City get around FFP.

2. Image Rights payments through Fordham Image Rights

In 2013 City sold our players' Image Rights to Fordham Sports Image Rights for £24.5m & they paid our players their image rights.

UEFA & Der Spiegel claim we did this to artificially inflate our income to pass FFP in 2013, which City vehemently denied, but this formed part of the breach for which we were sanctioned that year.

After reaching an agreement with UEFA in 2015, City wound up this arrangement with Fordham & by 2018 we'd brought the players' Image Rights back into club ownership & control.

3. Etisalat Sponsorship

UEFA & Der Spiegel claim that City took two payments of £15m (£30m total) in 2012 & 2013 from Abu Dhabi based Financial Broker Jaber Mohamed, disguising it as sponsorship money from Abu Dhabi based telecommunications company Etisilat.

To my recollection, this was bridge funding from from Jaber Mohamed, because the Etisilat sponsorship payment wasn't due to City until 2015. On the due date, Jaber Mohamed was reimbursed by Etisilat.

4. Non Cooperation

After submitting our interim accounts in March 2013 which UEFA passed, we submitted our certified accounts 4 weeks later, only to learn UEFA had shifted the monitoring period back by 12 months without our knowledge to include the wages of Carlos Tevez.

This meant from being £3m inside FFP, we found ourselves £3m outside the limit & were hammered with a £50m fine, a £50m per season transfer limit for 3 seasons, a CL squad reduction from 24 to 20 players for 3 seasons, & of that 20-man squad, 4 had to be club trained & 4 Association trained.

Conclusion:

UEFA/G14 brought in FFP to stop City ever challenging the hegemony of the European Elite teams.

As they made moves to stop us, we made legal counter-moves to circumnavigate FFP restrictions on our growth.

Legal is the operative word here. What City have done hasn't broken any UK, European or Abu Dhabi laws, BUT UEFA believe they've broken their FFP rules.

The question of right or wrong comes down to whether UEFA's rules usurp the sovereign laws of the UK, Europe & Abu Dhabi. They don't.

This comes to the heart of why City are in favour of an Independent Football Regulator (IFR) with CAS finding in our favour, & UEFA/G14 & the five founding members of the Premier League being Everton, Spuds, Liverpool, Arsenal & ManUre aren't in favour of outside regulation.

UEFA/G14 & those five PL teams are quite happy with English & European football being governed in their own self interests. City realised their FFP rules would make it virtually impossible for any newly minted outsiders to ever challenge them domestically or in European competition, so did what we legally could to progress to where we are today.

Hopefully I've got all this right, as I think it vitally important we sort the wheat from the chaff in defence of the club we love. )(

Agree this is a great summary, weren’t there five types of alleged breaches though. I seem to remember this was Stefan’s view?

 

[Dribble]

Agree this is a great summary, weren’t there five types of alleged breaches though. I seem to remember this was Stefan’s view?

There was a fifth, but @Prestwich_Blue says that one was all but dead in the water, so I only included the major ones he said could possibly pose us a problem. )(

 

[Elbow beards]

Lee going against the grain…. Again.

Brilliant

 

[There is a Light]

There was a fifth, but @Prestwich_Blue says that one was all but dead in the water, so I only included the major ones he said could possibly pose us a problem. )(

Okay thanks - do you remember what it was? Or @Prestwich_Blue can you remind me?

 

[Bluearmy]

There's one thing I don't understand, and I know the clever bods of Bluemoon will have the answers :)

How is it that the Premier League have FFP rules in the first place?

I assume it needed to be voted for by a majority of PL clubs. And obviously it suits the rags/scousers. But why did all the other clubs vote for it?

Vote for FFP = 4 or 5 "legacy" clubs.
Vote against = 4 or 5 clubs with aspirations to spend money (including City).
So a split vote so far.
For every other club, FFP means more admin, more scrutiny and less chance of ever becoming a top team.

Just seems weird to me.

It'd be interesting to know whether Everton voted for FFP.

They did. Inexplicably

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

Agree this is a great summary, weren’t there five types of alleged breaches though. I seem to remember this was Stefan’s view?

Off the top of my head the five headings were (roughly):

• Overstating our accounts due to sponsorships (presumably Etisalat)
• Failing to properly account for payments to players and managers (Mancini & image rights)
• Misstated accounts for PL FFP purposes
• Misstated accounts for UEFA FFP purposes
• Failure to cooperate

 

[Cassandra]

Not claiming any legal expertise, but common sense says that “private club” rules must take some notice of nation legal codes. To argue ad adsurdum the FA/EPL could not pronounce a death sentence on any perceived miscreant. A decision on whether club rules were compatible with national legal frameworks would seem naturally to fall within the national court system.

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

Not claiming any legal expertise, but common sense says that “private club” rules must take some notice of nation legal codes. To argue ad adsurdum the FA/EPL could not pronounce a death sentence on any perceived miscreant. A decision on whether club rules were compatible with national legal frameworks would seem naturally to fall within the national court system.

Stefan, as a qualified lawyer, has made this very point. Namely that the PL may say there's no statute of limitations on offences committed but English law doesn't agree.

 

[Paladin]

I do wonder how the hell Everton only have one charge then?
Reading some of the above means..
Ffp is over 3 seasons - so why aren't they charged on 3 separate seasons like we are?
Where's the subsection charges?
They failed FFP so their behaviour towards other clubs is questionable, if ours is.
Profitability and Sustainability?
Fucking witch hunting cunts.

The Premier League has been totally disingenuous about our situation. Compare how they announced their charges against us with how they announced Everton's charges.

Everton.

"In accordance with Premier League Rule W.82.1, the Premier League confirms that it has today referred an alleged breach of the League’s Profitability and Sustainability Rules by Everton Football Club to a Commission under Premier League Rule W.3.4. The assessment period for which it is alleged that the Club is in breach is the period ending Season 2021/22."

City.

"In accordance with Premier League Rule W.82.1, the Premier League confirms that it has referred a number of alleged breaches of the Premier League Rules by Manchester City Football Club (Club) to a Commission under Premier League Rule W.3.4."

Very similar, but in our case, they very helpful added every single charge, including "for Seasons 2016/17 and 2017/18, Premier League Rules E.53 to E.60." (8 separate charges under Profit and Sustainability, but not mentioned in the Everton announcement).

This creates a false narrative that Everton were guilty of just one breach, whilst City broke the rules 115 times. The PL deliberately created this scenario, and they have done nothing to correct the misinformation.

Together with the timing of our announcement, this stinks of a PL hatchet job on us, instigated by our rivals, as an attempt to stave off regulation whilst at the same time besmirching our name.

There are other strange anomalies on our rap sheet, such as the five charges for failing to comply with "B.14.6. the statutes and regulations of UEFA". How they can charge us with failing to comply with UEFA, when there is no proven charge from UEFA against us in the years specified, is beyond stupid. It wouldn't need Lord Pannick to successfully argue that one in a tribunal.

 

[LeonardoDaVnci]

The curious thing is all our UAE sponsors fall under suspicion, whilst the Red Top's US sponsors are all fine & dandy. I wonder

Not claiming any legal expertise, but common sense says that “private club” rules must take some notice of nation legal codes. To argue ad adsurdum the FA/EPL could not pronounce a death sentence on any perceived miscreant. A decision on whether club rules were compatible with national legal frameworks would seem naturally to fall within the national court system.

"To argue ad adsurdum the FA/EPL could not pronounce a death sentence on any perceived miscreant..."

If they could get away with it they would eg Rule A1a in the PL handbook 2025, with one conditional clause...

"only if the miscreant is a supporter, employee, officer, player, sponsor, balboy, ballgirl, owner of MCFC"....

 

[slbsn]

So basically as suggested by @projectriver Everton have received 6 points for failing FFP and then a further 1 point per £5mill missed by.

My question would be how much are the premier league actually suggesting that both us and Chelsea would have failed by?

That approach was rejected by the IC. And neither the City case nor the Chelsea off book case is a P&S case. It has a P&S issue (in City's case) but it is a consequence of the main allegations.

 

[Stoned Rose]

Pardon my ignorance but what is KOTK?

Rag.

 

[The Stockport Iniesta]

Lee going against the grain…. Again.

A breath of fresh air.

 

[The Stockport Iniesta]

Off the top of my head the five headings were (roughly):

• Overstating our accounts due to sponsorships (presumably Etisalat)
• Failing to properly account for payments to players and managers (Mancini & image rights)
• Misstated accounts for PL FFP purposes
• Misstated accounts for UEFA FFP purposes
• Failure to cooperate

It makes you wonder why the PL have never asked Mancini in for a chat, doesn't it?

 

[inchy14]

A breath of fresh air.

Too long so don’t listen, what’s the jist of what he says?

 

[The Stockport Iniesta]

Too long so don’t listen, what’s the jist of what he says?

An Arsenal fan, talking sense believe it or not. Basically calling out all the click-bait media, and the hypocrisy of other clubs fans. Worth a listen because it's so against the grain.

 

[HelloCity]

By that logic we shouldn’t have any pre match threads either.

I do wonder how the hell Everton only have one charge then?
Reading some of the above means..
Ffp is over 3 seasons - so why aren't they charged on 3 separate seasons like we are?
Where's the subsection charges?
They failed FFP so their behaviour towards other clubs is questionable, if ours is.
Profitability and Sustainability?
Fucking witch hunting cunts.

They didn’t.

It’s just the way the cases are ‘advertised’.

Everton probably broke dozens of rules.